Posted by John on Wednesday, 15 December 2010, at 6:27 p.m., in response to tracing history, posted by JaDub on Wednesday, 15 December 2010, at 6:09 p.m.

Go to the excellent Spanish American War history site at www[dot]spanamwar[dot]com and click on the link for "Unit Profiles, Rosters & Photos"

That will open up a list of units in numerical order. They have info on the 49th, 51st and 52nd Iowa Volunteers. You will have to open up each regiment and then each company's roster and search for your name (I'd do last name only).

There is a Benton County, IA, and also a Benton, and Benton City, the last two being tiny podunk places, so your guy could have come from any of these.